Epstein and Bannon Plotted to “Take Down” Pope Francis
New Epstein Files reveal a chilling alliance between Jeffrey Epstein and Steve Bannon — and a failed campaign to crush the Francis papacy.
Dear friends —
This is the beginning of a story few expected to tell: how Jeffrey Epstein, Steve Bannon, and a network of powerful men plotted against the Catholic Church — and against Pope Francis himself.
Today’s subscriber-only essay marks Part One of a new multi-part investigation from Letters from Leo.
We’re pulling back the curtain on the Vatican obsession that consumed Epstein in his final years, his strange communications with Bannon about “taking down” the Holy Father, and the emerging picture of how elite financial and political figures tried to undermine the first American pope.
What we’ve uncovered so far is deeply disturbing: books, emails, chat logs, and receipts all pointing to a broader pattern of Epstein surrounding himself with Vatican critics and traditionalist agitators determined to stop the reforms of Francis. Some of these names — like Bannon — are well known. Others will be less familiar but no less relevant.
Over the coming weeks, we’ll go deeper — mapping the alliances, decoding the messages, and asking why a man like Epstein was so focused on the inner workings of the Catholic Church.
Why was Francis in his crosshairs? And how does this all connect to the broader struggle within the Church — and the country?
This series comes at a critical moment. In just a few weeks, Republican operatives will begin mobilizing the Catholic vote ahead of the 2026 midterms and the 2028 presidential race. It’s clear they intend to build their strategy on the same alliances we’re now investigating — the very forces that sought to silence Francis, suppress his message, and reassert control over the Church’s future.
We won’t let them get away with it.
That’s why we’re doing this series: because the faithful deserve to know what’s been happening behind the scenes. Because history has shown that when bad men get too close to sacred institutions, the damage can last generations. And because no one — especially the Vicar of Christ — should be targeted by secretive billionaires with dark agendas.
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In a shocking exchange from 2019, billionaire sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and former Trump strategist Steve Bannon discussed a plan to “take down Francis,” referring to the late Pope Francis.
Chat logs show Bannon bragging to Epstein about targeting a who’s-who of perceived enemies — “The Clintons, Xi, Francis, EU… come on brother,” Bannon wrote, lumping the reformist pope in with political foes. Epstein appeared to encourage Bannon’s anti-Francis crusade.
At one point Bannon even quipped that Epstein was now an executive producer on a project codenamed “ITCOTV” — seemingly In the Closet of the Vatican, a tell-all book about Vatican secrets.
Epstein responded with a single cryptic word — “Porn” — before Bannon vowed again, “Will take down Francis.”
The messages read like a far-right thriller: a disgraced financier and a populist ideologue conspiring against the leader of the Catholic Church.
This explosive revelation raises new questions about Epstein’s ties to conservative Catholic circles. Bannon has long aligned himself with traditionalist Catholics hostile to Pope Francis’s reforms, and here we find Epstein — a secular Jewish man known for his decades long sex trafficking crimes — apparently in the loop on that “take down Francis” agenda.
The idea of an American financier meddling in a Vatican power struggle sounds like fiction, yet these messages are evidently real.
They form part of a larger trove of Epstein’s communications recently made public by the U.S. Department of Justice, offering an unprecedented glimpse into his far-flung networks. It seems Epstein had positioned himself at the nexus of several global power streams, including the Catholic culture wars.
An Obsession with Vatican Secrets
Epstein’s correspondence reveals that his interest in the Holy See went far beyond casual curiosity — it verged on obsession.
Here’s what we know.
